Talking About Human Trafficking

She’s had a front row seat to politics for more than three decades, but Cindy McCain never got in the game. But not anymore. McCain has gotten involved in the issue of human sex trafficking and doesn’t mind getting a little angry and a lot political over it.

McCain’s focus is on the women and children enslaved in the commercial sex industry here in the United States, especially in her home state of Arizona. “Kids are being systematically moved around the country for purposes of sex,” McCain explained. “And most people when they hear the word ‘human trafficking’ believe, ‘well that happens in Cambodia, that happens in India, it doesn’t happen here,’” McCain continued.

Besides being more and more of a public face on the issue, she’s pulling political strings behind the scenes. She teamed up with Arizona Governor Jan Brewer, co-chairing the Arizona Governor’s Task Force on Human Trafficking, so legislation is “ready to roll” come January when the state’s legislative session begins. “We were actually really poor on the issue,” she admitted. McCain also teamed up with New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, whose state is hosting the Super Bowl this year, to do some work as well.

McCain’s involvement stems from doing nothing a decade ago. “I was in India and this is about 10 years ago and … I was there with Operation Smile and I was finishing up and went shopping, like all good women do, right?” she began. McCain went in search of a sari for daughter Bridget. She entered a shop and heard a rustling below the floorboards. When she asked the shopkeeper about the noise he replied that it was simply his family. “But I finished payment and I was kind of looking around and I could look down through the slats a little bit…there was no family, it was a lot of little eyes, there were a lot of little girls below those floorboards,” McCain said. “I walked out of the store and I never did anything … and it’s haunted me ever since.”